When I first sent ALL I NEVER WANTED to my beta readers, one returned the very first page with a note that changed the way I described my characters:
First and foremost, this is a story of redemption.
But it’s also a love story. A love story that begins with a black eye and a mental health facility, and while that hardly seems the setting for a modern romance, and I’m the last guy anyone would consider a knight in shining armor, trust me when I say I’d suffer a thousand black eyes to meet her again. But before there was the rehab and the fist to the face and the falling for a girl with jagged nails and graphite smudges on her fingertips, there was my dad’s annual holiday party. And it happened like this. . . .
I don't remember how I first described Summer Evans in the prologue, but it leaned toward blonde hair and blue eyes and was, in a word, boring. It was the beta who suggested I re-think how I first presented Summer to the audience. Hair and eyes are great, but those jagged nails and graphite smudges tell a much deeper story, don't you think?
It's the little details that will add life to your story. I could've gone on about how massive Trent's house was, but I zeroed in on the columns--the leaves carved into the capitals--and it really only mattered that Crewe knocked a server's tray out of her hands at their dad's party, but it's more exciting when it's a silver tray of miniature cannoli which scatter, rolling across the marble floor.
The little details aren't so little, then, so don't equate little with unimportant. It's the small things that the reader will remember--that will breathe life into your story.
Be Brilliant!
~Katie~
